Winner of Coronado Community Read Announced

The winner of the Coronado Community Read 2018 vote is in! The Library announced the winner tonight at the Coronado Cultural Arts Commission meeting: Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline.

For this year’s program, nominations were accepted from the public, and a public vote was held to determine the winner. 42 titles were nominated, including the six finalists: Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline; The House at Sugar Beach, by Helene Cooper; Barbarian Days, A Surfing Life, by William Finnegan; And the Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini; The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World by Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, and Douglas Carlton Abrams; The Wright Brothers, by David McCullough. There were over 300 votes and the clear winner was Ready Player One.

Ready Player One is a science fiction story set in a dystopian future. According to the Library’s press release, “The story follows high-schooler Wade Watts and his online friends on their hunt to solve the biggest game ever and win the ultimate prize: ownership and control of the online world and its founder’s fortune.”

The purpose of the Coronado Community Read program is to bring the community together through the “shared reading and discussion of one book.” In this case, the novel should have broad appeal to the Coronado reading community. It is appropriate and appealing to young readers, as witnessed by its receipt of the Alex Award by the Young Adult Library Services Association of the Library Services Association in 2012. And according to the Coronado Public Library, “[it] is filled with enough action, video gaming and futuristic technology to enthrall readers under 30.” At the same time, it holds appeal for adult readers who will be left “reminiscing over the music, films, video games and movies of their youth.”

According to GoodReads, Ernest Cline is a “novelist, screenwriter, father, and full-time geek” who lives in Austin, Texas. Although Ready Player One is Cline’s first novel, it was a New York Times and USA Today bestseller which is currently set for release in movie version, directed by Steven Spielberg, in March 2018.

In the event that Ready Player One leaves you wanting to read more from Cline, his second novel, ARMADA, was published in 2015.

The Coronado Public Library will partner with other organizations and individuals in February and March to host book discussions, film screenings related to the background of the novel and a “Roundtable program on emerging technologies, an exploration of the history and relevance of the science fiction genre and its impact on society, and a musical celebration of the 1980s.”

Purchase your copy of Ready Player One at Bay Books and when you mention the Coronado Community Read receive a 20% discount.

Luan’s background spans a range of industries from academia to management consulting to investment banking. Along the way, she earned an undergraduate degree in political science at Northwestern University, a PhD in the same field from the University of Michigan and an MBA from Columbia University. She has lived on both coasts and many states in between, as well as in Bulgaria and Germany. Have news to share? Send tips, story ideas or letters to the editor to manager@coronadotimes.com